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Sunday, February 8, 2009

Missing Saker Falcon. A request has been made by a member of the Public, to try to find a missing Saker Falcon. The Saker Falcon recently went missing in the Dublin area of Inchicore / Ballyfermot. It has been suggested that if anyone can monitor 216.10MHz FM to try to pick up her signal, which is a constant beep to contact Gerard at 086 3640975

What's strange about this......other than the fact it's about a missing bird.....is that 216.1 MHz is right in the middle of Band III TV in Ireland.

A little more digging suggests that the collar may have come from the USA where that frequency seems to be used for tracking.

Channel I on Band III is at 215.25 Mhz. Now it just so happens that Network 2 is broadcast from Mt.Leinster on Ch I. So, considering that 216.1 MHz is right in with the video signals and if this bird heads for the mountains, this tracking collar (probably milliwatts) is going 'head to head' with a transmitter with an ERP of 230 Kilowatts!!

The best chance of hearing that bird is probably if it lands on someone's TV aerial and causes TVI ;o)

Friday, February 6, 2009

I came accross this video clip on the net. EI100CQD was a special event station that was operational over the weekend of the 23rd to 25th of January 2009. I heard them mentioned on the IRTS news but the station didn't seem to be operational on 80 metres so it was very difficult for any EI stations to hear them.

The video clip shows Tony, EI5EM operating the station EI100CQD and having a contact with Jarda, OK5JM in the Czech Republic.